On Becoming a Leader is an advice column in which Allison Fine, an author, consultant, and expert on nonprofit management, answers your questions about nonprofit careers and leadership. Have a question? Ask Ms. Fine using this form.
Q. How can I most effectively lead people who used to be my peers? — Amy
A. Congratulations on your promotion, Amy! And now the hard part comes — doing the job.
Your question is deceptively complicated because it involves managing your own expectations and behavior and also helping others manage theirs. A double whammy!
Let’s start by looking at what you need to do to be successful in your new position.
I imagine you may have worked with your colleagues for a while and naturally have done what peers do every day, made fun of the old boss and second-guessed her. And now you’re her. Not an easy seat to sit in.
Too often in these situations, new bosses bend over backwards to have an open door with former peers and try to maintain the old, chummy relationships. That is a surefire pathway to failure. All it does is make everyone uncomfortable and everything messy. You can’t continue to have the same degree of openness with people who now rely on you for their performance reviews and raises and their own potential promotions. You need to make the lines of authority clear. Everyone needs to know the rules within which you plan to operate in your new role. Specifically, you need to answer the following questions for your staff:
- How often will the entire staff meet, and how often will you meet with individual staffers?
- What is the most productive way for staff to provide you with feedback on your performance?
- How will you provide feedback on their performance on a regular basis?
A warning: The issues these questions raise are difficult to put into practice. It is one thing to say that you’re open to input and advice and even criticism, but it is quite another not to get your hackles up when people tell you that you ran a disorganized meeting (which would have felt better organized if they had arrived on time!) or they find it frustrating when you change your mind. If receiving constructive criticism is a problem for you, if you tend to stew over it too long or go on offense rather than take it in, now would be a really good time to get some coaching to become better at understanding criticism and engaging with critics.
And now the flip side: How are your new subordinates feeling about your promotion? I don’t know your specific circumstances, but I am going to assume that not everyone is happy about it and a few of your former peers are jealous. It is important to have one-on-one conversations with everyone on your team and to get any ill feelings on the table quickly. Nothing sours a team’s performance more than ancient grudges. It is important to have a candid discussion with them about what your promotion means in terms of their position. However, be careful not to sound like you’re inviting your new subordinates to vent about everything with you, their new boss. This is your opportunity to try out your new role and to make the new boundaries clear. You need to act like a boss to be treated like one. It’s time to raise your game and demonstrate what it will be like for them to work for you.
Here are steps to making sure these initial meetings go well:
- Set up an initial meeting with everyone you supervise and have a written agenda.
- Don’t think you have to have the answers to every question. If you don’t know the answer, say you will find out and get back to them — and then do it!
- Don’t try to solve hurt feelings. Listen and acknowledge their feelings but then move forward, because you can’t fix their hurt. Only time and a good working relationship can do that.
Here are some good resources for support as you continue on your career path:
Manager’s Resources Handbook
National Council of Nonprofits Resources and Tools
Intro to NP Management at Idealist.org.
Finally, Amy, don’t feel guilty about being a friend’s new boss — you earned your promotion. Now you have to earn the next one!
